So, How Does It Feel To Be Done?

The first question everyone asks us. Well...It doesn't feel all that good, to be frank. Everyone, including us at some point, I'm sure, had an expectation that we'd be pumped up and proud of what we'd achieved. But really? On our last ride, we were both just quiet and sad and a little tearful.

And then it was just over.

It's not that we're not proud of ourselves, it's just not that "WHOO!" kind of proud. What we did took months and it was neither easy nor hard. And, more than anything, what we did was quiet. One day of ever evolving countryside slipping into another while we rode with the tacit understanding of mutual support. And, really, that's all there was to it.

What amazed me on a daily basis was not what I could achieve with my body, not how far I could ride or what hills I could grind out, but the easygoing peace of mind I was able to step into while my body occupied itself with getting strong, being strong, and, in that world of fresh air and sunshine and birdsong, I had nothing left to focus on but the surprising landscape of my own uninterrupted thoughts.

And then we found ourselves at the top of Signal Hill gazing out over the Atlantic and there was nowhere left to go but home.

So, how does it feel to be done? I think it feels like we're not quite ready yet for all the noise.

Believe it, Baby!!!

Yesterday, we dipped our tires in the Atlantic Ocean in "The Gut" in Quidi Vidi, Newfoundland!

Our quizzical, non-celebratory expressions are more of an "Is that camera timer working? Was that a beep? Did you hear a beep?!?" look than an "I'm wrestling with an existential crisis because I just finished biking across Canada and now there's nothing left to do but pack up and fly home."

While there's so much to say yet, I'm still on Newfoundland time, which means that I've woken up on the West Coast at 6:30 in the morning to discover that my body is outraged that it hasn't had its coffee yet.

A Final Word on La Route Verte

I know I've raved about what a fantastic experience La Route Verte is already, but really, I (we) just can't rave enough about how much fun we had cycling in Québec. I think the one detail I forgot to mention about La Route is that it provided us with numerous opportunities to meet other cyclists. We made friends with Benjamin, who was training for a triathlon and who lead us on a reckless whirlwind ride through Montréal, and Ken and Adrian, who were biking from the Yukon and Victoria respectively and with whom we passed a fun afternoon biking and chatting on the way to Rivière du Loup, and Anton who had biked across Asia--ALL of Asia--then flew from Japan to Vancouver and biked home to Québec, a trip that had taken him over two years. Anton's legs? Were like grain silos. It was just great fun to have other cyclists zipping in and out of our days and sharing a piece of our adventure with us.

The other great thing about La Route Verte is that is takes you right from Rivière du Loup to Edmundston, New Brunswick on a tree-lined trail. It was two of the best days of riding we had on the trip, with lush scenery, lakes, and rivers and even a few wheat crops! I could go on, but I think the pictures speak for themselves (and I have a ridiculous 20 minute time limit at this Internet cafe!).

No Detail Left Behind

Yet another disturbingly detailed sign in Québec.

I would like to know if this sign would be any less effective if the injured child's sock wasn't half off, or if there wasn't the dramatic pause created by the ellipsis before "le vôtre."

Pas de Ca-ca

I think perhaps this sign suffers from too much detail. Imagine being the graphic designer working for the city of Montréal and getting your original design back with a note along the lines of: "While we liked how realistic your silhouette of a Great Dane looked, what we want is a steaming loaf of crap somewhere on the sign. Just so there's no confusion."

Elvis Sighting!!

The King's disembodied head was seen presiding over the hostel bar in Québec.

Ed note: Apologies for the grainy quality of the shot. We had to use the camera phone because, as we all know, The King is elusive and fanatical about remaining underground, so we didn't have time to go back up to the room to get our camera.

Fell Down a Hole

After Québec City, I fell down a hole. That may sound like I'm trying to craft some metaphor for my morale, perhaps using a loose Alice in Wonderland allusion for just how fantastical my morale tumble was. But, no, my morale is perfectly intact. I'm being literal. We stopped at a campground about halfway between Québec and Rivière du Loup, and I fell down a hole. One second I was walking towards the fire to put another log on and the next second, FOOMPH! Fell down a hole.

Specifically, my left leg fell down a hole, its rapid progress to the underworld slowed only by the friction created between my flesh and the craggy rocks lining the hole, while the rest of me stayed above ground wondering what the hell had happened. It was so thoroughly dark out that my brain had very little sense data to go on and I spent a couple of seconds mentally grasping to put the pieces together: in many ways it felt as though I'd fallen...yet in many ways it didn't. And, wait...my left leg really kinda hurt.

At this point, I realized that I was very crooked and that straightening myself would involve a certain amount of careening towards the fire, so I grabbed Kieran's arm rather firmly. Kieran gallantly responded to my panic by barking, "Hey! What are you doing?!?"

Once I extracted myself from the hole, I sulked over my lack of a knight in shining armor for a few minutes. That is, until Kieran pointed out that when he tripped and fell into a tree in Ottawa, I had laughed out loud at him all the way to the Museum of Civilization.*

So, long story short, it's been a long time since I've been able to write, but it's been business as usual for us.

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*In my defense, I asked him if he was okay before braying with laughter.